Blog Goals 2011

It's that time again. And yes, I know that nobody but me is interested in my blog goals. But it's dang fun to blog about, so here goes.

First, let's see how I did with last year's goals. Here is a link to them.

1. Post Often.
Well, I didn't post every week on every one of my blogs. But I did post much more often on this main blog. I guess I'd say that I accomplished this somewhat, since I posted 113 posts in 2010 vs. 53 posts in 2009.

2. Organize my labels.
Did NOT do.

3. Increase my followers to 25.
Did not do that either. It went from 7 to 12, so that's pretty good.

4. Increase my feed subscribers to 25.
Totally did this. I'm not sure what it used to be, but now I have 57 followers. Wow.

5. Comments: One comment per post.
Didn't exactly do this, but I did way increase my comments. Most posts have at least 1. I'm pretty happy with my comments/post, actually.

6. Post more about my spirituality.
Didn't really do that.

7. Weekly polls.
Ditched this goal.

8. Get 4,000 hits.
I think I said by the summer I should have that many. I'm not sure, but as of this posting I have 6,762 hits. That's great!

9. No complaining posts.
Hmm. Why was this a goal?

10. Monthly funny things
Didn't really do this.

11. Picture and a link with every post
Didn't do this.

12. Sidebar list of all the books read 2010
Working on it, but I decided to make it a post page instead.

13. Sidebar list of all the movies seen 2010
Not a chance.

14. Do not change the template for 6 months.
I think I've actually accomplished this, thanks to blogger's awesome new design software.

Drumroll...

BLOG GOALS 2011

1. POST OFTEN 200 posts in 2011

2. Increase Followers to 25

3. Increase Feed Subscribers to 100

4. Post more about my spirituality, once/week

5. Get 15,000 hits

6. Picture and link with every post

7. Book reviews of all books read 2011

8. Movie reviews of all movies seen 2011

9. What Was For Dinner 2011
A section of my blog is going to be devoted to cooking, specifically what I cooked this year. So don't expect 365 photos, since I'm not going to cook every meal. Imagine how weird it would be to take a picture of my dinner when over at a friend's house. Hmm. Not going to happen. But part of this experiment is Danny's and my goal to make a list of things to cook again.

10. Style Quips 2011
Last December was Style Month. It was great. And you know what? I've finally found an excellent topic for web comic. Keep checking out my blog for more on this.

And, that's it. And in order to keep up with one of my blog goals, here is a picture of Jane.

Blog Goals 2010

Okay okay, so nobody but me is interested in my personal blog goals...you don't have to read this post if it is boring to you. It's fun for me.

I'm reviewing/revising the last blog goals that I had:

1. Post often: i.e. every week on this blog, every week on Jane's blog, and every week on our family blog. Since we moved a billion miles away from all our siblings, I'm thinking about writing a monthly email update (SHORT! Don't worry!) to send to everybody, but also to post on the family blog, possibly? My blog archives say that I wrote 53 posts in 2009. That's an average of once/week. Of course, I did write like 5 in one day a few times. But hey. I swear that soon I will update Jane's blog. I know that's the one that people actually care about.

2. Organize my labels. Yes I will get to that.

3. Increase my followers to 25 by next year. Okay, so with the google followers I think I now have 7 or 8. But with my feedburner subsribers, it's like 39. So that's good.

4. Increase my feed subscribers to 25 by next year. CHECK!

5. Comments: Get at least one comment per post. So here's why I completely changed my template AGAIN. My mom has been telling me for months that she couldn't comment on my last template. I just thought...well...sometimes she's not the most tech savvy person. But then this week I had like 4 people tell me on facebook that they couldn't comment either. Sorry to underestimate you, mom! So I found a blog template that should be easy peasy for people to comment on. I'm not so much digging the whole transparency thing. Thanks, Kelly, for recommending http://shabbyblogs.com - I found the one I like on http://www.yummylolly.com (I'm glad she changed her name to "yummy lolly" from "suck my lolly". That just sounds dirty! But her templates are good.) So NOW you can comment!

6. Post more about my spirituality. I haven't really done this so much yet. But I can and should.

7. Weekly Polls: I really think that polls are cool on blogs. I want to have one about once/week. Actually, I tried this for a while on my other blog, and it wasn't as cool as I thought it would be. No more.

8. By this time next year, 4,000 hits!!!!! I think I will make that goal, as it's only January and I have 3,300 something hits.

9. No complaining posts. Well..................................that's easier goaled than done.

10. Monthly Funny Things post. This is a good idea.

New Goals:

11. Post a picture and/or a link with every post. That's more interesting and fun for people to read.

12. Do a sidebar list of all the books I've read in 2010.

13. Do a sidebar list of all the movies I've seen in 2010.

14. DO NOT CHANGE TEMPLATE FOR 6 MONTHS: I can change the template again in June, but not before. If I do, it will be a pain in the rear. It is actually ALWAYS a pain in the rear to change templates. Sigh. Maybe someday I will get into making my own, because it seems a lot more productive than searching miles and miles of the internet and only encountering junky crap that people try to pass off as templates. Sigh.

Okay that's it! Let's get cracking.

Jane's Blog

I decided to start a separate blog for updates about Jane. The world is just too creepy of a place for me to be posting details about my baby in a public setting, so I made the blog private.

This is the blog's URL: http://janechallis.blogspot.com

You won't be able to see it if you aren't invited, though.

If you would like to be invited to read this blog, email me and I will invite you.

If you don't have my email, click on the button that says "Contact Me" at the top.

That being said, I probably will sometimes put photos/videos of Jane on this public blog, because she is SO much a part of my life. I just think it would be better to reserve details to a private setting.

Hope to see you there!

Blog Goals 2009/2010

A little less than a year ago, I set some goals for this blog. I'm going to give an update on how I've been doing:

1. Write on my blog often


Well, as long as "often" doesn't mean every day, I think I've been doing fairly well on this one.

2. Put photos on my blog often

This proved difficult. The old blogger post editor sucked when it came to posting photos.


3. Get people to read and check my blog often.
I have increased my readership, but again, what the heck does "often" mean?

So, I think I ended up doing pretty well on all of those goals. Here are my new goals:

1. Post often: i.e. every week on this blog, every week on Jane's blog, and every week on our family blog. I don't know...our family blog is kind of...not as fun to write on as the other two. So we'll see. Maybe I will discontinue that blog.

2. Organize my labels: it's kind of dumb to have labels that only are on one post. I can always just search the blog if I want to find something. Labels are for organization, but as of now, they're not really doing much.

3. Increase my followers to 25 by next year. I know that not everybody uses the google followers thing, but some people do.

4. Increase my feed subscribers to 25 by next year. This will probably be much easier than getting "followers" because people can read feeds in a billion different ways.

5. Comments: Get at least one comment per post. The way to do this is by commenting on other peoples' blogs. So that is what I will do.

6. Post more about my spirituality. In last month's Ensign, there was a huge article about sharing the gospel via blogging. Some of my friends have started separate blogs as places to post stuff about their beliefs. I don't think I want to do this because a. I don't know how many people would read it anyway, and b. I don't want to set up a whole new blog. I'm a picky template chooser. I'd have to burn another feed, which while this is not difficult, it still is just one more thing on the list of things to do....So back to the goal, I think "more" would mean about once/month. That is the goal.

7. Weekly Polls: I really think that polls are cool on blogs. I want to have one about once/week. Maybe it will slow down to once/month, but let's aim high!

8. By this time next year, 4,000 hits!!!!!

9. No complaining posts. Let's face it. Blogs suck as places to complain. People misunderstand what you have to say. You come across as a complete and total jerk.  You can't ever explain yourself as fully as you would like in this forum because it is at worst a one-way medium, and at best a slow two-way medium (when people comment). Writing is a limited form. Plus, complaining is just depressing. Not a good thing to do. That being said, I don't plan on making this blog a fluffy-bunnies-kittens-rainbows place. I just want to avoid gripe-sessions.

10. Monthly Funny Things post. Those will be fun to look at later.

Revamping th'ole Blog

Yeah...I like to blog. Or at least, I used to. Then things happened like...school, and getting married, and...soon I realized that I missed my old friend, katesamericanlife. So here I am, back at it again.

When I realized I was pregnant, I thought, "Oh! I could totally blog about this!" Now, you should realize that I DO sometimes, if infrequently, update our family blog, which is challisadventures.blogspot.com - but the thought of taking over that blog as my pregnancy venting blog was not appealing. What if someday our kids want to use it for...something? You know?

So then I decided to make a new blog. But thinking about all of the blogs that are started and never finished, or never written on started to make me shudder. Seriously, there are so many wastes of excuses for blogs out there! Cyber junk. Someone should put them in an insinerator.

So FINALLY I decided to revamp my old blog. The title is catchy, if you ever listen to NPR, that is. Which I do. Every day. For almost the hour that it takes to get to and from work.

Et voila! This is her! Beautious, lovelious...I hope you enjoy it. Sometimes I write my blog goals - and so here they are for 2009, albeit a month early:

1. Write on my blog often
2. Put photos on my blog often
3. Get people to read and check my blog often.

Tchao!